by Lia Lee
She noted with a hint of neighborly curiosity that there was a midnight blue Bentley parked in front of the building. The only person in the eight-apartment block who ever entertained visitors that wealthy was Angie, who seemed to enjoy a host of expensive boyfriends. The Bentley was new, though, and Briony hoped this one would prove to be the man of Angie's dreams.
She paused at the foot of the cement stairs, finally noticing that there was a man standing at the door. He wasn't one of her neighbors, and her mind flashed to the muggings that had been happening in the area. Surely it couldn't happen to her, not in the middle of the day with her baby on her...
Then the man turned, and Briony felt weak in the knees. No, there was no way. Sensing her mother's sudden tension, Eva sent up a thin howl.
"Briony? You okay?"
Angie had walked up behind her without her notice. Her neighbor carried her own shopping bags, and she looked up the stairs suspiciously at the man who was watching her impassively from the top.
"This guy giving you trouble or something, Briony?" Angie's tone promised trouble, and Briony finally managed to shake her head.
"No," she said faintly. "That's...that's Eva's daddy."
Chapter Seven
To Angie's credit, she made a point of telling Briony and Marco that she would be in all day, and if they needed anything, she would be right there. Briony was thankful for her neighbor's concern, but there was no way in the world to quickly explain the situation to her and put her mind at rest.
Hell, she wasn't even sure she could do it for Marco.
Wordlessly, she let him into her apartment, suddenly aware of how very shabby and small it was. She had been so proud of it when she’d gotten it, and Seanan had been so happy to cosign the lease for her. She watched as Marco looked around. He wasn't in a tux, but even his jeans and tight black T-shirt looked far more expensive than most of her furniture.
The silence stretched out between them as he turned his eyes to her. She had put down her groceries, but she hung on to Eva as if her daughter were her shield.
"Are you going to introduce us?" he asked softly, and god, his voice was just as she had remembered, so perfectly smooth and masculine, like coffee with just a dash of Irish cream...
"Introduce... Oh! Um, yes. Come a little closer..."
He did as she said, and Briony tugged Eva free from her wrap. Eva looked at the newcomer with interest, her eyes just newly able to focus on faces.
Marco reached one hand for her, but he looked uncertain as to how to proceed. Briony saw a moment of doubt flicker across his face, but then Eva settled things for both of them. She laughed brightly in delight at this brand new person, and her hand flailed forward to grasp at his finger. Marco sucked in his breath a little, and suddenly Briony could remember how it had been, just a few short weeks ago, when Eva had done that for the first time.
"Strong," Marco said, and Briony nodded.
"Very. The doctor says she's very active for her age."
"Doctor..." He looked up in alarm. "Has she been sick?"
"No. It's just what you do for babies. I didn't know it until...well, until I had to."
A dark cloud passed over his face. He started to say something, but Eva made a slight sobbing sound. He drew back in surprise, but Briony knew well enough what it meant.
"Aww, sweetie, I kept you out too long. I know, I know, you're tired..." She glanced at Marco. "I need to put her down for her nap. Do you mind...?"
"Not at all," he said, as gracious and lordly as if they were in his home and not he in theirs. Biting her lip, Briony walked back to the smallest bedroom where the crib was located. She got Eva down with a minimum of fuss, grateful the motions were at this point so ingrained that she could simply go through them.
She looked down at her sleeping daughter's face. It wasn't the first time that she’d thought Eva had more of her father in her face than her mother, but it was the first time she had been able to compare so vividly.
As she passed the tall mirror in the corner of the nursery, Briony saw a young woman with lavender circles under her eyes wearing the same stretchy green dress she had been wearing for the last two days. She was a far cry from the girl in velvet who had danced with the handsome masked man, and that made her feel a stab of disappointment and dread.
She ventured back into the living room as if she were entering enemy territory. In a way, she supposed she was.
Marco was looking at a piece of framed art she had picked up at a yard sale, a painting of a Victorian party at a boating exhibition at the park. The painting was cheery and bright, adding some much-needed warmth to her otherwise plain apartment, but she wondered if it was tacky in his eyes.
"Marco," she started, but that was as far as she got.
In one moment, he turned and crossed the floor towards her. He dragged her into his arms with a grasp like iron, as if he were afraid to let her go. The heat sprang up between them as if it had been just a matter of hours and not an entire year since they had seen each other.
She opened her mouth, perhaps to protest or urge him on, and he sealed his mouth over hers. The sheer hunger in his kiss took her breath away, but it wasn't just because of the power that lurked in his body. No, it was also because it met a hunger that was just as intense, just as profound in hers.
Briony had thought something inside her had fallen asleep after she’d found out she was pregnant with Eva. Perhaps it was a hormonal issue, or perhaps it was because she had left something behind. She had been far too busy to look for it or even to think about it much, but now she realized what it was. She had been a pile of tinder without a match. Over the last year, that tinder had only grown drier and drier. Now here came Marco with a match, and with a flick of his wrist, the match was thrown and a bonfire roared up out of the dry wood.
"I can't get enough of you," he murmured, dragging her even closer. His words in her mouth were delicious, and that was before he pressed his tongue between her lips. Boldly, she drew on his tongue with her lips, relishing the groan he uttered. If he had power over her body, she had power over his as well, and it was too easy to remember straddling him, riding him with all that pleasure surging through her.
She molded her body to his, soft to hard, and it was sheer, primal satisfaction when she felt him rise against her. She started to reach for his aching erection, but then she felt as if someone had dumped a great deal of cold water over her head.
What the hell am I doing?
Marco was a little slow to realize what was happening, but when he did, he paused. He looked down at her, and even though his eyes were hazed with need and desire, he regarded her evenly.
"What's the matter?" he asked. "Too fast? Was I too rough?"
"No, not that," she whispered, and then she shook her head. She pushed against him. It was like pushing against a brick wall for a moment, but then he backed off. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him adjust himself briefly before turning to face her again.
"What is it?" he asked again, and she found her tongue.
"This isn't me," she whispered, shaking her head. "No. This isn't. What we just did, god, what we did in Italy, that wasn't me at all..."
"I might beg to differ—"
"No," she said loudly enough that she was suddenly worried she had woken Eva. She listened, but there was no thin, answering wail. When she spoke again, her voice was more moderated but no less emphatic.
"I'm not someone who has sex with strangers. I don't have flings, I don't give in to a momentary flash in the pan attraction, I don't...kiss strangers so intimately..."
For a moment, Briony was confused. Was that hurt that flickered across Marco's face? How in the world could she hurt him?
"Well, then, we're lucky that that's not what we're here to discuss, is it, Briony?"
She blinked. "How in the world did you know my name?"
He started to answer, but then he shook his head. "I have come a long way. Will you sit?"
She smiled a little
at how naturally it came to Marco to simply offer her a chair in her own home, but she came to sit next to him on the couch. She stayed close to her end away from him, and there was that flash of disappointment again.
"I know your name because I went to the premiere of Look Again."
She blinked. "You went to Seanan's premiere?"
He nodded, a slight smile on his face. "It was entirely by chance. I had just been dumped in a very public fashion, and I was looking for something to do. I assume that someone sneaked that premiere onto my schedule without my noticing it. For once, it paid off, and I went."
It was on the tip of Briony's tongue to ask about that dumping before she remembered that it was absolutely none of her business. Still, she felt a bit of jealous anger flicker across her mind that she absolutely no right to, and she gritted her teeth.
"I thought Seanan was you," he admitted, and Briony stared at him. Why did it suddenly feel as if every part of her was hollow? Why did she feel as if she were spinning off into space?
"Don't worry, that didn't last. I knew at once that Seanan was not the woman I was with a year ago."
"Oh, I suppose that makes sense. Seanan's way too glamorous and beautiful and..."
"Nothing of the sort," Marcus said sharply. "You know, the woman I was with would never put anyone down so cruelly, especially not herself and her daughter's mother."
Briony felt as if she had been slapped, and she glared at him.
"Then maybe you don't know me at all!" she spat, and an answering light danced in his eyes. She reminded herself to be careful, but this situation was already so strange. There was no way to behave appropriately or to really figure out what to do. Every few minutes, she was getting her feet knocked out from underneath her.
"It doesn't matter," he said ruthlessly. "But there's more you need to know. Don't worry about Seanan betraying your confidences. I brought her and the cast along to a private club, and I made sure that they all got very, very drunk. I pried the story out of her by bits and pieces, and as soon as I knew what I needed to know, I made sure she got back to her hotel, and I returned to the palace."
"The...palace?"
He stared at her. "Are you serious?"
"Yes, as a matter of fact, I am," she shot back. "Why are you going back to the palace? You got my sister drunk, you took her home, and then you went to a palace?"
"Yes, where I live," he ground out. "The modern ducal palace."
"But why?" Briony nearly wailed it, stopping herself just in time by thinking of the baby.
"Because I am the prince of Florence," Marco said, watching her with narrowed eyes. "Because there were already fights about the succession when we met, and I thought you knew then, or that at least you knew after that. My uncle died six months ago, and I’m styled Prince Marco Bianchi, Lord of Florence and Duke to the Islands of Carmody."
She stared at him, sure that this had to be a put-on. However, as she scanned his face, she could find absolutely no humor in it at all.
"I wondered if that was why you ran,” he said softly. “I could come up with a dozen reasons why you might have done so, and that was one of them. Perhaps you were one of those sly girls with notches on your bedposts for princes and other nobility. I was just a count then technically, but it has meant as much for other girls."
"Did...did you wonder very often why I ran?" The moment the words were out of her mouth, she wished she could call them back. They sounded vain and taunting; worse, they sounded mean.
Marco only shrugged. "Of course I did. I am glad that you were not simply looking for another notch on your bedpost. I wondered if you were married. I wondered if you were a nun." At her look, he grinned a little. "Baldassare throws wild parties. It's been known to happen."
"And you had no idea who I was at all..."
"Until yesterday, no. But it is a very long flight between Florence and New York, and then from New York to Los Angeles. I had a great deal of time to think."
"And what did you think about?" she asked through dry lips.
His eyes were like obsidian. "I thought about my daughter, and I thought about how you seem to have kidnapped a royal Florentine princess from her home."
Chapter Eight
Briony clutched her hands together so hard that she thought the bones might crack. "No."
The word was soft, but it was perfectly clear, almost bell-like. In the back of her mind, she wondered what it was about Marco that brought out this other person in her, that made her so loud, so clear and so direct.
"No?" he asked with a frown.
"No. No, you are not going to take my daughter away from me. No, I am not going to let you say that I kidnapped her when you didn't even know she was alive."
His eyes were dark, and there was a violence of emotions there that should have taken her aback. Instead, even as her body tingled with remembered pleasure and a kind of need she had almost forgotten, she was filled with strength. She might never have been able to muster up this strength for herself, but finding it for her daughter was easy.
"Why didn't I know about my daughter?" he demanded. "It wasn't as if I simply laid her aside on the street! I never knew about her at all, and that was a choice you made, that was something that you took away from me."
"Keep your voice down, you'll wake her," she snapped, and to her surprise, Marco subsided.
"Why shouldn't I have taken you at your word?" she asked, and he look startled.
"What are you talking about now?"
"The things you said. How women couldn't defend their own honor, and how no matter how hard she tried, a woman would never have the character that a man could. Do you think I want my daughter growing up with that viewpoint echoing in her head, never thinking that she was anything on her own? Always thinking that there needed to be a man in her life?"
"If she took her proper place as a princess of Florence, she would never be left to deal with anything," Marcus said stonily. "She would be given everything she could ever want, and if a man dared crossed her..."
He looked around the apartment, distaste clear on his face. "She would be born to a palace, wanting nothing. Instead, here she lives..."
"Don't say it," Briony spat. "Don't. This place is perfectly fine. She's safe, she's loved, and I care more about her than I have ever cared about anything."
Marco made a move as if he wanted to grab her and shake her, but he stopped himself at the last moment, shaking his head instead.
"Do you truly believe that our daughter is better off here in a tiny apartment than in a palace in Florence being offered the world on a plate?"
"Here she is loved. That's what matters the most, it's what's always mattered the most, isn't it?"
For the first time, Marco dropped his gaze. He was too proud to say that she had won, but she saw a peculiar kind of defeat in his eyes.
"I am leaving now," he said, his voice icy. "But this is not over, Briony."
She said nothing, only waited until he had stormed out of her apartment. She managed to stay standing until he had closed the door behind him. Then after she latched the door, she fell onto the couch, a flood of tears wracking her body.
She tried to tell herself that she was scared for her daughter, but somewhere deep down, Briony knew it was not that. She had seen the awe in Marco's eyes when he’d seen Eva for the first time. The world might be large and terrifying, but it looked like Eva had won a protector for life.
No, her grief was far more selfish. She had thought that she had forgotten Marco. She had done her best to forget the one-night stand that had changed utterly everything in her life. Now she realized that even if memories were buried, they might come up again in the blink of an eye.
She could still remember the night she had danced with a masked man, and how it had felt to be someone else. Now it seemed she would suffer the rest of her life wanting to be that person again.
***
Briony decided that forewarned was forearmed. She needed to know more about the s
ituation than she did, and that meant researching the heck out of everything involved.
She started with American family law, which told her that Marco did have a claim to his daughter, especially if a DNA test was taken. Still, courts would give it more weight that he hadn't been involved in the first few months of his daughter's life. It was extremely unlikely that Marco could take Eva away from her entirely. When she realized that, Briony breathed a sigh of relief.
What would it look like for her daughter, she wondered, living between two such separate worlds? Would Eva grow up to hate her humble beginnings in Los Angeles? Would she demand to live entirely in Florence? The thought stabbed Briony right through the heart, but she shook it away as best she could. That was a worry for the far future.
Briony wanted badly to call Seanan, at the very least to talk with her about meeting Marco and spilling the beans, but Seanan had taken off on another shoot, this time one in Nairobi. Her social media was full of shots of exotic stunts performed on racing cars, of face paint and hikes into the desert. She decided against trying to contact her sister, even if she might have sorely wanted the support. Seanan had always looked out for her, but this was a situation that she had to handle on her own.
Finally, Briony gathered all of her courage and started to look up Marco himself. The moment she Googled his name, she realized it was probably sheer chance she had never run into a mention of him before this.
Marco's life read like something out of a dream or perhaps a historical novel. He was a Florentine noble by birth, though of a cadet branch. He had a tidy fortune to begin with, but he had parlayed it into something immense and impressive, returning the Bianchi name to the limelight.
Briony flinched a little at page after page that detailed his assignations with models and starlets, pictures of Marco shirtless on his yacht with a woman on each arm and a wide, white grin on his face. For a while, it seemed as if he was associated with a new woman every week, but then things had changed.
